Pink Glow

As usual spring has come in a rush over the last few days and now a lot of the early flowerers are coming through thick and fast.

I was a little caught out earlier this week when the gardens' owner Chris James pointed out that the view of a pink Rhododendron just outside the walled garden was being obscured by a self set Fuchsia Ricartonii. I was forced to admit I had not noticed that this particular Rhodo was in flower. Shortly after coffee I went to investigate and sure enough, there was a beautiful specimen of R. Calophytum in full flower. It is a lovely pale pink form standing about 2.5 meters high with long drooping leaves. My excuse was that the colour from a distance is not disimilar to the Christmas Cheer that stands only a few yards away and had been flowering for about the last month so I think I had just been seeing a pink glow in that general direction. Not a very good excuse I know, anyway the wild Fuchsia has gone now.

As well as the buds of various Rhodos swelling fast, our Camellias are starting to flower including our pair of C. Donation on the steps leading down to the walled Garden. They are definitely the best that I have ever seen of this variety. As you know, usually they are very straggly but these two are very bushy.


A few weeks ago I reported that we had an Aeonium Urbicum Zwartkop that had so far survived outside in a container. I am pleased to report that it is now starting to bud up and send out some very bushy new growth. I was also suprised to notice today that the one Zonal Geranium we had accidentally left outside in an open position, near the tea room, has also survived. I was also quite relieved to see that all the Echeveria Harmsii that I planted sideways in a wall outside the Gardener's Cottage have come through the winter unscathed.

Lastly on my list of heros is my old favourite Arctotis. Just a couple of plants managed to hang on in a position that had less sun than the others but they were in a corner and so less exposed. It's not exactly been a mild winter here - our coldest night was only -2C but from what I gather, our losses have been fewer than lots of places in Devon and even Cornwall.

March Hares

Just before we got to the end of February, on the 26th to be precise, we had the first buds begining to open on one of my favourite Rhodo's. The reason that I like it so much is that it has more than one period of interest..the plant I am talking about is R. barbatum.

If you're not familiar with it, it has very dark scarlet flowers which tend to highlight the beautiful pinky bronze peeling bark. I always remember seeing several of these at Stourhead, I wonder if they have started to flower yet down in Wiltshire?

Another early bird Rhodo that started to flower in February is fargesii. Its pale rose flowers are suprisingly large for its size and abundantly produced.

Torosay has a large number of Daffodils around the gardens, some of them very old varieties, fortunately a number of them have started to flower. already. As one of my staff is Welsh it meant she was able to have a few blooms in the house for St Davids day.

We have had to start getting ready for what we hope are going to be lots of visitors. The 1st of April is rapidly approaching when we open the gates to the house, so lots of gravel has been spread about on the forecourt and the Tea room terrace to give the place a fresh new feel.

Talking of opening the gates we have had to do a bit of work on them aswell, rabbits and hares are quite a problem in the garden so keeping them out is of paramount importance. Rabbit netting is vital but on the gates it gets a lot of extra wear and tear so something tougher is needed for this purpose. We have been fixing some one inch square welded mesh sheets onto the gates so that should hopefully do the trick.

Down by the railway on the shore most days there are a pair of hares running around in their winter coats, pure white as driven snow. Just a couple of our many friends from the animal kingdom that reside on the Torosay estate.